Buddhism in Central Asian History

This chapter examines the history and character of Buddhism in each of the six main regions of Central Asia: Kusania, Kroraina (Shan-shan), Sogdiana, Khotan, Kucha, and the areas populated by the Uighur (a Turkic people). As Kaniska, the fourth ruler of the Kusān empire, was a notable patron of Buddhism, it is likely that during his reign a number of Buddhist missionaries went from his empire to Central Asia and China. Since the 1990s there have been significant new discoveries of many ancient Buddhist manuscripts from northern Pakistan, eastern Afghanistan, and Xinjiang, a large geographical area that Richard Salomon calls “Greater Gandhara.” The heyday of Kroraina as a Buddhist kingdom seems to have been around the first and second centuries. A considerable number of Buddhist Sogdian texts, along with Manichean and Nestorian Christian manuscripts, were discovered in East Turkestan.